“o dolce napoli,
o suol beato,
ove sorridere,
voile il creato;
tu sei l’impero
dell ’armonia—
santa lucia!
santa lucia!”
signor grabbini, impresario of the theatre of la scala, resolved to give up his valiant but ruinous fight for the legitimate drama. such pieces as othello, francesca da rimini, the count of monte cristo, acted with a complete cast, had proved a strain too severe for the treasury as well as for the capacity of his ten-foot stage. in scenes where the entire company was “on,” the jam became so great that spirited [pg 45]pushing set in, each actor aiming to hold that part of the stage allotted to him by the playbook. in the struggle, conducted sometimes with stealthy art, that the audience might not be aware, toes were trodden upon and tempers badly stirred. thus it happened that after the curtain had rolled down, the ladies and gentlemen of the company were likely to fall to shaking their fists at one another, naturally to the delight of the audience, who could hear the wordy battle very distinctly. wherefore signor grabbini decided to change the policy of his theatre.
one night he stepped before the curtain to make the momentous announcement. before he could open his mouth a sailor-man, red as hiawatha, reached over from the wicketed parapet of the gallery and cried:
“a clasp of the hand, comrade!”
with a gallery so low as that it were folly to court dignity, so the little man shook the big hand and then began his [pg 46]speech, which he punctuated with glances at a piece of white paper that he held. in glittering words he set forth the motives that animated him in deciding upon a change from the plan of amusement that had been so successful, so profitable to himself, and so agreeable to the signori of the company. but it was because he wished to serve better, to captivate even more the highly esteemed, the eminent, the generous italian colony, that in the future there would be no five-act tragedies, but a veritable banquet every night of short comedies—oh, so laughable!—from the pens of the world’s greatest dramatists, in the true italian as well as the dialect of sweet naples.
“bravoes!” from all over the theatre put a stop to the speech for a moment. men in the orchestra pens leaned over the edge of the stage and lit their cigarettes at the footlights, and, taking advantage of the pause, the meal-cake man shouted his wares.
“but this is not all, my friends,” went on signor grabbini.
[pg 47]
a fresh shower of bravoes.
“keep your feet off my head!” cried a man in the pit to one in the gallery.
“bah!” gave back the other, drawing in a huge boot between the wickets; “in this theatre one can not stretch his legs.”
“silence! hear the impresario!”
“beginning on sunday night,” said the man on the stage, “i shall have the distinct honour of presenting to the highly discriminating taste of the most esteemed and eminent patrons of la scala an extraordinary singer of canzonets.”
“bravo, signor grabbini!”
“silence!”
“meal cakes! a soldo each!”
“silence, thou donkey!”
“with your permission, ladies and gentlemen,” the impresario went on, bowing low, “i will proceed. the artist to whom i have referred is—ah! my friends—she is an angel of delight—a glorious type, a creature magnificent. my word of honour, the most beautiful woman in new york—nay, [pg 48]in all america. to the artistic world she is known as juno the superb. pay strict attention, my compatriots. the evening of the feast of sunday will indeed be an occasion most extraordinary, for it is my honoured privilege to inform you that in addition to the famous comedies and the exquisite juno, there will be an oyster cook in the audience under the especial administration of the management, who will prepare soups of sea fruit in true neapolitan style and at prices the most moderate.”
“bravissimo!”
“meal——”
“silence! evviva the oyster cook!”
“with these my humble words, highly prized patrons, i will conclude, and from the depth of my heart beg you to accept my most cordial gratitude, and the assurance that in the future as well as the past you will find me ever alert to serve faithfully and to the plenitude of my power the highly esteemed, the eminent, the generous italian colony.”
[pg 49]
“long live the impresario!” was rained from all parts as he backed off, salaaming.
“evviva juno the superb!” piped one voice.
“and the oyster soup!” thundered a sicilian hod-carrier.
at length the curtain was raised on the last act of the tragedy, and the knights and ladies, buffoons and sages, soldiers and huntsmen, began moving about the stage gingerly, with great skill avoiding collision as they crossed or ducking their heads when they made exits, hurried or slow, through the dollhouse doors.
on the feast of sunday a packed theatre bore witness to the wisdom of signor grabbini’s change of policy. from the base-board of the stage, which was fringed by a row of shrubby black heads, to the last tier of benches there was no vacant seat. the first of the short comedies was reeled off without a single toe trodden on, since it required only five dramatis personæ. not a joke went begging, for the audience heard [pg 50]them all twice—first from the prompter, who bawled them from his little green coop at the footlights, and again from the mouths of the actors.
next came the star of the evening, juno the superb. as the orchestra—blaring its brass—struck up the prelude of her song, signor di bello entered the tiny proscenium box and dropped into a chair. the fame of her plethoric beauty had reached him, as the impresario had taken good care it should reach many an appreciative masculine ear. he was a very different-looking man to-night from the signor di bello of business hours, clad in a long drab blouse, hacking parmesan and weighing macaroni. now he showed brave in snowy shirt front of bulging expanse, large diamond, black coat, white waistcoat, lavender trousers, and a gorgeous bouquet stuck under his left cheek.
when she appeared in the glare of the lights, draped frankly in the odd colours and tinsel frippery of the campania peasant [pg 51]maid—as she is seen nowhere but on the stage—it was plain that the impresario had made an intelligent guess. her exuberant charms were sufficient to deal even that audience a start. the men caught their breath, and the women made wry faces. had they possessed eyes for anything but juno, they would have seen that the grocer in the box was smitten hard by the sudden picture of billowing womanhood and glowing flesh tint. “ah, what beauty!” he breathed, leaning farther over the rail, deep in the spell of her great hazel eyes, the peony of her cheeks, the soft tawn of her neck, and shoulders that shaded down to clearest amber. “pomegranates and hidden rosebuds! by the egg of columbus!”
and in truth she was, as every man had to own, as fine a woman as ever came out of italy or any other country. but this did not keep their teeth off edge when she began to voice “santa lucia,” that evergreen canzonet of naples. she pitched upon a key that baffled the orchestra. the leader stamped his [pg 52]foot and shifted tones in vain. only deaf ears could have failed to perceive that it was her generous friend nature and not art that had opened to her the stage door.
“madonna maria!” was the criticism of luigia the garlic woman. “she has the voice of a hungry goat on a foggy morning.”
but there was one pair of eardrums on which her bleating did not grate. they belonged to signor di bello, in calmer moments a man of very good hearing. but he was stone deaf now. before the levantine charms of this thrilling creature all his senses were absorbed in sight.
“brava, bravissima!” he shouted at the interlude. “oh, simpiaticone!”
“what a whale she is!” said a phthisic cigarette girl to her promised husband, who heard her not.
“an ugly figure she makes, truly,” sneered a barber’s wife to her husband. “a big cow like that in the frock of a child! no honest woman, one sees easily. and [pg 53]look, adriano! her nose! i find it similar to the snout of signora grametto’s little black-faced dog.”
there was no gainsaying this bold touch of the supreme sculptor’s realism. glorious her black tresses, delectable her form and colour, uptilting and ample her nose.
the canzonet ended, she walked off without bowing to or glancing at the audience, but the men, one and all, their eye thirst still unslaked, joined in signor di bello’s frantic demand for an encore. on she came with stolid countenance and began the song all over again, although the women had set up a hissing that matched the strength of the applause. signor di bello called the flower girl into the box, bought an armful of her wares, and threw them wildly on the stage. they fell in a shower on all sides of juno. instantly she stopped, put her arms akimbo, and while the orchestra played on, glared blackly at her vehement admirer. flowers for a neapolitan of the porto! blossoms that have poison in their breath! [pg 54]stupid di bello! stupid genovese! twelve years in mulberry, and to forget the hatred that neapolitans of naples have for natural blooms! perhaps you thought she was from the country, like most of the people there. bah! in such a serious matter one ought to be sure.
it was the women’s golden chance. they started a titter of derisive laughter that became a gale and swept through the theatre. juno moved toward the box, trampling the odious flowers, and spat in the face of signor di bello. then she left the stage, followed by an outpour of boorish gibes.
“infame! infame!” it was the voice of bertino, crying loudly from the last row of benches, under the gallery hard by the door. with a firing emotion that he did not know was the green fever, he had watched the doings of his uncle, and when the bright colours rained about her, brushing her cheeks and hair, and whisking her shoulders, he thought with a heart-fall of the wretched blossom his hand had bestowed a [pg 55]week before at the wooden bunch. madre santissima! his uncle kissed her with lovely flowers, and he, miserable soul, kissed her with a spot of yellow paint. but when the people laughed and sneered, and he saw her anger kindle, her cause was his own. the pigs and sons of pigs! to laugh at her! at his queen, the amorosa of his dreamland, by sunglow and starshine, asleep or at work. grander than the dames of genoa palaces, more beautiful than the peaches of california. and his uncle! the old mooncalf! he was the cause of it all. served him right that kiss she gave him back. ha-ha! but these jeers, these hounds yelping at his queen! “infame! infame!”
the people thought he meant it for juno, and took up the cry, which did not subside until the bay of naples and the cone of vesuvius rolled up from the bottom, and the second comedy began. signor di bello had no appetite for this, and he left the box, passing out amid the nudges and snickers of the first families of the genovesi, milanesi, [pg 56]and torinesi, who were there in force along with the flower of the calabriani, napolitani, and siciliani. but he put a good face on the matter, and at the door hailed the impresario:
“ha, signor grabbini! your singer has at least one liquid tone.” and he disappeared, chuckling.
